Chapters International

In-Person Workshop

OVERVIEW:

There have been books and workshops about individual writing conferences, and there have been books and workshops about individual reading conferences. In the day-to-day life of a classroom however, most teachers are doing both, with the same group of students. The key to a successful reading and writing workshop, especially in a PYP framework, is connecting the two - balancing individual work with end-year expectations and curriculum goals.

The key to powerful literacy instruction is listening to children, but in a different way than we may be used to. In international schools, students come with particularly rich, diverse cultures and experiences – and teachers have unique opportunities to connect these individual perspectives to their reading and writing. Radical listening means being present, being curious, and being diagnostic – but perhaps most importantly, it is an invitation for the student to be an active participant in his or her own learning.

In reading and writing workshop, our objective is to teach children to read like writers and write like readers. Individual conferences are perhaps the best place to help students understand these connections and make links between their reading and their writing. Moreover, they are a powerful way to teach students “to shape their own ideas through acts of literacy” (Gholdy Muhammad, 2020).

In this interactive, two-day workshop, Dan Feigelson will:

provide teachers Grades 2-8 with classroom-ready, step-wise structures for both reading and writing conferences, focusing in depth on their similarities and differences;
introduce practical strategies for what to listen for and how to respond to students, in conferences as well as in whole and small group instruction;
suggest actionable tips for connecting individual conferring work to larger, whole class curriculum goals;
go over strategies for conference note-taking, assessment, and time management;
suggest concrete ways that individual conferences can honor student identity and help children become critical, independent thinkers.

Learning OBJECTIVES:

DAY 1

Conferring basics

Introduction: Principles of Listening
Why confer? Literacy and Student Identity
Reading and Writing Conferences: Similarities and Differences
Teaching to the partial understanding

Reading conferences

Learning the content of comprehension
Teacher reading activity (experience what students experience), debrief
Structure of a reading conference
Teacher as diagnostician
‘Go to’ reading conferences

DAY 2

Writing conferences

Qualities of writing: What exactly do we want to teach?
Teacher writing activity (experience what students experience), debrief
Structure of a writing conference
Planning, drafting, and revision: conferring into the writing cycle

Nuts and Bolts

Connecting individual conferring work to larger curriculum goals, and to a PYP framework
Opportunities for reading-writing connections
Scaffolding conferring work through partnerships, book clubs, and read aloud conversations
Record keeping and assessment
Planning for conferring
Time management tips
Routines and strategies for sharing (and celebrating!) conferring work

POTENTIAL AUDIENCE:

Classroom teachers of grades 2-8, literacy coaches, reading and language arts specialists, curriculum coordinators, and administrators

Dan Feigelson

Dan Feigelson has worked extensively in New York City schools as a teacher, staff developer, curriculum writer, principal, and local superintendent. An early member of the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project, he leads institutes, workshops and lab-sites around the world on the teaching of reading and writing. A regular presenter at national and international conferences, Dan is the author of Radical Listening: Reading and Writing Conferences to Reach All Students (Scholastic 2022), Reading Projects Reimagined: Student-Driven Conferences to Deepen Critical Thinking (Heinemann 2015), and Practical Punctuation: Lessons in Rule Making and Rule Breaking in Elementary Writing (Heinemann 2009).

He divides his time betweenNew York City and the Hudson Valley, in upstate New York.

Venue:
International School of Hannover
Address: Bruchmeisterallee 6, 30169 Hannover, Germany
Phone: +49 511 27041650

8:30 am to 3:30 pm
Registration at 8:00 am
on the 8th of October 2022